This is a fossil tree is supposedly extending through millions of years of strata. Think about that. Does that make sense.

(Click on photo for high resolution)

How long does it take to form sedimentary layers? Charles Officer is a research professor at Dartmouth. In his 1996 book, The Great Dinosaur Extinction Mystery, he says, "...a rate of one centimeter per 1000 years is typical," p.56. But just look and think about this 30 foot fossil tree. It is one of hundreds found near Cookville, TN in the Kettles coal mines which derived their name from the shape of the lower portion of these fossil trees. This tree begins in one coal seam, protrudes upward through numerous layers and finally into another layer of coal.

Think about that. What would happen to the top of the tree in the thousands of years necessary to cover it at the rate postulated by Officer. Derek Ager, one of the world's best known statigraphers, addresses this challenge, acknowledging "...standing trees up to 10 m high in the Lancashire coalfield of north-west England. ...Obviously sedimentation had to be very rapid to bury a tree in a standing position before it rotted and fell down. ...Standing trees are known at many levels and in many parts of the world. ...we cannot escape the conclusion that sedimentation was at times very rapid indeed and that at other times there were long breaks in the sedimentation, though it looks uniform and continuous," The New Catastrophism, 1993, p.49.

In spite of how it looks, long periods of time are still claimed, "shoehorned" between the layers, where there is no evidence. Now, which is really better science...imaginative explanations about why things are not as they appear to be, or a determination to follow the implications of what we actually see?